Thread: need help !
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Old Jan 01, 2008, 12:51 PM
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Rapunzel Rapunzel is offline
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Social Anxiety or GAD are good possibilities given what you described. Another disorder that can be related is Avoidant Personality Disorder. I have been diagnosed with all three of the above at various times, and I do relate to what you are describing.

If you are in college, chances are that there is a student counseling center and there will be someone there who can help you with this. I think that a lot of young people have these symptoms to various extents, and university counseling centers are often quite experienced in treating social anxiety symptoms.

Individual counseling can help a lot, but I really would recommend group work for you. I was very scared about the idea of group therapy, and you might not like that idea right now either, but it would most likely be a group with people like you who would understand how you feel because they have a lot of the same symptoms. You can learn skills together and practice them with each other that way. My only regret about going to a group for social skills was that I joined the group at the end of a semester and the group ended way too soon.

Oh, and I tend not to notice my anxiety symptoms either, until someone points them out to me. I override them, or ignore them. It does sound like you are having some distress though, and it is interfering with your life. It doesn't matter so much what diagnosis you get, but there is help for this and it can be very effective.

Let us know how what you decide to do, or if you need help finding resources!

Rap
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